Jun Togawa

After gaining attention as an actress and as guest singer for the Halmens, she began her professional music career in the early 1980s as a singer.

Although her eccentric personality and unconventional style prevented her from attaining major pop success, she survived as an influential and respected underground music figure both solo and as the lead singer of Guernica (1982–89) with former Halmens member Koji Ueno and her most commercial project the Yapoos (1984-1995 and occasionally since). Over the years she has formed many temporary backing bands such as the Jun Togawa Unit to accompany her. Generally the differentiation between her self-named bands and the Yapoos is a greater degree of collaboration in the latter.

Notable collaborators over the years have been Haruomi Hosono who produced and wrote music for some of her earlier works. Her late sister Kyoko Togawa was an actress who at times ventured into the music world and cross collaborated at times. Around 1990 Jun shared management with Susumu Hirasawa resulting in quite a number of collaborations.

She has acted in a number of films, including Untamagiru and The Family Game.

Her most recent CD of completely original material to date, Togawa Fiction (2004), with the Jun Togawa Band, featured elements of progressive rock, electropop and other genres. More recently, in 2008, she released a career-spanning three-CD boxed set, Togawa Legend Self Select Best & Rare 1979-2008 which featured many of her most popular songs along with several scarcer tracks and hard to find collaborations.

In a 2001 interview, influential alternative musician and producer Jim O'Rourke, amongst others, picked a Togawa cover song album 20th Jun Togawa as one of his "best albums of the year."

• Jun Togawa, Guernica, Yapoos, Koji Ueno, Yoichiro Yoshikawa, an annotated discography compiled by Nicholas D. Kent.
• Jun Togawa at Allmusic.
• Jun Togawa on Twitter (Japanese)